


The Fall of the House of Potter

by SherlockMalfoy



Series: Arius Spyridon [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Background Manipulative Dumbledore, Child Abuse, Childhood Trauma, Dumb of Ass Good of Heart, F/M, Family Secrets, Fleamont Potter is not a good person, Fluff, Forced Genderbending, Genderbending, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Marauders, Minor appearances by Tom Riddle and Death Eaters, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Remus is a good bro, Trans Female Character, Trans Male Character, Waaaay waaay far away from Canon, mature themes, relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-11
Updated: 2020-05-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:49:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24123136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SherlockMalfoy/pseuds/SherlockMalfoy
Summary: At some point, the Potters were in debt and the Malfoys bailed them out. This isn't that story. This is the story of Fleamont Potter and the terrible, horrible thing he did to avoid having to pay that debt back.or...How Jamie Florence Potter was subjected to a shit ton of trauma, forced to change genders, and still turned out mostly okay and still managed to find happiness with a group of misfits along the way.or...The tragic love story of James Potter and Lily Evans
Relationships: Euphemia Potter/Fleamont Potter, James Potter/Lily Evans Potter, Remus Lupin & James Potter, Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Series: Arius Spyridon [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1740568
Kudos: 26





	The Fall of the House of Potter

**Author's Note:**

> So.
> 
> Taking a break from the main story, Unconquered, I bring you this tragic tale of angst, feels, a bit of fluff, idiots in love, some comedy of errors, a wee bit of slapstick in there somewhere, and a whole ton of body image issues and horrible parenting and childhood trauma and the wizarding world in my AU is a really REALLY fucked up place.
> 
> It starts off light, gets dark, gets darker, gets light, and eventually we're gonna end up with Harry Potter as an orphan. But hey! some background stuff that's mentioned in the other fic so yay for further worldbuilding and exposition!
> 
> Also.... going to get this out of the way right damn now before anyone gives me flack about it.
> 
> Pronouns in this for James and Lily are used the way that they are on purpose. I'm not deliberately misgendering anyone. Yes, I'll straight up say that both Lily and James in this fic are trans. One by choice, one not by choice. Sometimes I'll use she when normally I've been using he for a character and visversa - that's a deliberate narrative choice given the scene and situation. All in all, it doesn't matter because both characters are in a good place in their relationship and emotionally before they die and are happy with themselves.
> 
> There. I've said my piece. If you're still not happy with that, oh well.

Euphemia had been ill for days. Nothing worked to soothe her stomach and eventually she had no option other than to visit her and her husband's private healer.

That day she rushed home, filled with joy and surprise and ordered the elves to make her husband's favourite meal. To make his favourite dessert and have his favourite slippers ready for him when he returned home.

The Potters had a grand meal that night, and Fleamont suspected he might have forgotten something rather important. Was it someone's birthday? An anniversary perhaps? Oh... had he forgotten again?

Finally, when it came time for dessert, he couldn't take it anymore and put down his fork, looked across the table at his blushing wife and instead of asking what it was he'd forgotten he said, "Merlin woman you're red as a tomato! Are you sure you're not still ill?"

"I'll be ill for a while longer yet, dear," she said, smiling as she picked at her dessert.

"It's nothing serious is it?"

"I was thinking Florence for a girl," she said idly before picking up her glass that Fleamont only just now noticed had pumpkin juice instead of wine as she normally drank with her dinner. "And James for a boy."

"What?"

She set down her fork, sipped her juice, and raised an imperious brow as she waited for her husband to realize what she had said.

His hazel eyes grew wide as he finally caught up. "WHAT?!"

"I'm pregnant dear," she said with a ruby painted smile. "So, the room beside ours will be turned into a nursery of course. And then-"

Her words were lost in the sound of a chair scraping back and her husband's shouts as he jumped about, arms flailing wildly as he just couldn't keep himself still at the news. Finally, he settled himself and came back to the table, his short black hair wild from his hands repeatedly running through it, or his fingers tugging and twisting this way and that in his excitement and disbelief.

"Really?" he finally asked her from where he stood across the table.

Euphemia nodded. "It's true. The healer confirmed it this morning. Six weeks along now."

**o0o**

Given her age, the pregnancy of Euphemia Potter was not smooth in the slightest. At four months, when the child's core was starting to develop she began to haemorrhage and had it not been for the house elves quick response to their mistress's distress the child would have been lost. From then on, Euphemia was on bed rest. That is not to say she didn't get out of the bedroom. Fleamont had a special bed made for his wife that could be moved about the manor. Even out to her gardens where she could enjoy the sun and the fresh air – within reason. She had two house elves assigned to attend to her every whim and need.

And after 9 months, in March of 1960, Fleamont Potter finally held his and his wife's child. The first, he hoped, of at least a small handful.

"Jamie Florence," he had said to his wife the day their lovely little daughter was born. "Hopefully, in a few years, her brother will follow."

**o0o**

Euphemia Potter would become pregnant three more times over the next four years.

And at 4 months on the nose, as if with Jamie Florence, she began to haemorrhage. Unlike with their daughter, she lost each one soon after.

She became withdrawn, and spent more time focusing on their daughter than she did giving thought to trying to conceive an heir for her husband. She had reconciled herself with the fact that the noble name of Potter would die with them. Whatever family their daughter married into would absorb the titles into itself when Fleamont and his wife passed on.

**o0o**

When Jamie was five, she didn't understand what was going on. Her mother was afraid and her father was acting so strangely. Her parents were fighting a lot. And the elves were taking all of her dresses out of her closet.

"We have no choice!" she could hear her father shouting. "I'll not marry her off to that... that... That disgusting, wretched-"

"Then refuse!" her mother shouted back, just as angrily. "I'm sure Abraxas can find some other foolish house ready to throw their daughters at him! Cygnus has three to spare!"

"I cannot simply refuse! Have you not seen what they have done to the Honourable House of Weasley?! They'll ruin us and then continue to-"

"Surely there must be another way! If you do this to her... You know she'll never be able to have any children of her own! You'll only be extending your wretched family name one more generation. And Jamie will be the last instead of yourself!"

"If it keeps my child safe, Phemie-"

"Oh don't you Phemie me, Fleamont Henry Potter!"

And they had carried on like this, not knowing all the while their daughter could hear them as the elves continued to purge her wardrobe of anything deemed fit for a girl.

**o0o**

"I don't like it," Jamie complained as her mother sat in the corner of the room, eyes red from crying all night as she had done every night that week. Every night since she took everything of hers out of the bedroom she had shared with her husband and moved into one across the manor from him.

Jamie tugged at her short hair with a frown.

"I know darling," her mother said, the smile never reaching her tired eyes. "But it's the way it has to be now. To keep you safe. There are very cruel men in the world, my sweetling. And they will stop at nothing to get what they want."

"Is that why you and daddy don't talk anymore?"

"You're very astute," she said. "Now, repeat after me, darling," Euphemia said from her chair in the corner. "Hello, my name is James Potter."

"But it's not!" Jamie shouted back.

And her mother's heart broke. "I'm sorry, but it must be now. Please, we must practice this to make sure you get it right."

Jamie crossed her arms over her chest, refusing to do as she was told. It was bad enough her father's elves took her favourite dolls. Her favourite bonnets and dresses. But this? This was just going too far in her five year old opinion.

**o0o**

Jamie learned when she was six exactly why her father had done what he had done soon enough.

The Potter family was invited to a Yule celebration held by the Ministry of Magic. Unfortunately since her father was Lord Potter, they couldn't really wiggle out of it. Now that Jamie was six years old, it was expected that Lord Potter bring his eldest child and heir with him and begin introducing the child to society.

Jamie was dressed in boy's dress robes. Her hair was styled appropriately for a young male heir her age. She was reminded how to behave, speak, and act around the other children and the adults.

And when she was introduced to a man named Abraxas Malfoy and his son Lucius, she found them entirely repugnant.

"Pity," Lord Malfoy had said when he had seen her. "I had high hopes that my great grandfather's marriage contract could be fulfilled and this debt between our families cleared at last."

"Yes," her father had said, resting a firm hand her on her shoulder and giving it a gentle squeeze. "Pity. Perhaps James will surprise us in the future and our grandchildren can see the clearing of the debt through."

"Hmm... Perhaps," was all Lord Malfoy would say as he looked down at the child before him. "Come, Lucius. Lord Black has brought his nieces. Perhaps we will find a suitable... replacement... among them."

Later, Jamie would be found by Fleamont in the men's loo, hiding in a stall and her legs pulled up so no one could see her feet. "I've been looking everywhere for you, James."

"S'not," she said, wiping at her face. "S'not my name."

Fleamont held his daughter close and rubbed her back as she pressed her face into his shoulder. "I'm sorry, child. I just want to keep you safe..."

**o0o**

When Jamie – no – James was eight, she- he got his first broom.

He took to it quickly, and nearly gave his mother a heart attack every time he zipped passed her as she sat in the gardens.

He would do crazy stunts that had his father shouting at him and his mother fainting. But he couldn't help it. Flying over the estate on his broom... it was the only place he could be alone. The one time of day he could just... be. He could pretend he was still Jamie having little tea parties in the garden with his mum watching on. He could pretend the wind was whipping long, silky black hair around this way and that. That he never had to drink that nasty potion when he was little that turned him into such a...a... freak.

He wished he could just fly away and never come back. Fly away and grow out his hair and buy as many pretty, frilly dresses as he wanted to and not have to worry about Malfoys and Blacks and Lestranges all trying to cheat his father out of the family fortune. He didn't know then when he first met the Malfoys, but he knew now what that was about.

They expected his father to bring a girl. A girl to marry off to that repugnant boy Lucius. He wasn't supposed to know what went on around people like Mr. Malfoy, but it wasn't his fault his father could shout with the best of them every time Mr. Dumbledore and his friends came calling.

**o0o**

James was given a potion his father had invented once a year to take during the summer. A potion that would hide what he used to be. He still didn't have... all the parts... like other boys. But in all the other ways that mattered he was a boy.

And so when he got his to Hogwarts on his eleventh birthday he wasn't surprised to see it addressed to Mr. James Fleamont Potter instead of Miss Jamie Florence.

He was disappointed that it worked well enough to hide him so thoroughly.

He'd had hopes of going to school and have them realize they'd made a mistake after all.

But he would learn as he rode the train to Hogwarts that first time, there was no such luck.

**o0o**

James didn't like girls.

It was one of the few things that hadn't – couldn't be – changed about him.

But the moment he set eyes on that Evans girl... he was gone. She was perfect. Everything he wished he was and more.

And she hated him. Which made him admire her all the more.

**o0o**

He was 12 when Remus found out.

James had overslept and it was one of the nights Remus usually wasn't in the dorm so he didn't think anything of nipping off into the showers to have a quick clean before popping back to the room. Usually he waited for everyone else to finish, or if he was feeling particularly bold he'd get up early, take his uniform with him, and be ready before anyone else was up. After the first awkward year, he had it down to a science by now.

So to say he hadn't been expecting Remus to come into the boy's showers that morning at the late hour he was in there was entirely honest.

Remus, for his part, was just standing there in shock. Amber eyes wide and slowly raising a hand to point at the naked girl in the bathroom as she quickly tried to cover herself from his gaze. James didn't bother saying anything as he ran out, wrapped in a towel, embarrassed as hell and panicking that somehow, his dad would find out someone knew and he'd have to marry that scumbag Malfoy after all and he could completely picture having to leave Hogwarts and... and...

"James?"

James stopped pacing, realizing he was still naked under the towel. He grabbed a blanket from a nearby bed and wrapped himself in it. "It's not what you think!"

"I.... I don't really-"

"Don't tell anyone! Please Remus, you have to swear not to tell anyone! If you do, I... Please!"

James didn't know if it was the panic in his voice or the fear in his eyes, but Remus sighed, grabbed a pair of pants and a shirt, and threw them at his best friend. "Get dressed, James," he said. "McGonogall's already going to be on us about missing breakfast."

**o0o**

A month later, Sirius came to James with a wild theory about their friend Remus.

"It makes sense, James! He always disappears every month like clockwork. And when he comes back, he's covered in all these... scars and scratches."

"He's got scars all over his face to begin with," James said. "I don't see how you can notice any others."

"I see 'em often enough. And you would, too, if you bothered to shower with the rest of us."

James rolled his eyes. "Some people like a little privacy in the loo, Sirius."

Sirius nudged him playfully with his elbow. "You just don't want anyone to see you wanking to thoughts about Evans."

"Ew!" Peter exclaimed, lifting his head up from where he was laying on his bed studying. "I hope you clean up after yourself, James! Other people use the showers, too!"

"I do not shower alone to wank to Evans!" he protested, a bit too much. But Sirius grinned and ran with it anyway.

"Anyway, so, Remus has to be a werewolf. It's the only explanation for everything," he said. "Now, we can't tell him we know he's one, otherwise he'll get mad. So here's what we'll do instead..."

**o0o**

James lay on his back in the grass beside Remus, the pair of them staring up at the clouds while they waited for Peter and Sirius to get out of detention.

James had just celebrated his 14th birthday. He and the boys had a surprise for Remus the next full moon. It took them a while to figure out something, but when they had... it was perfect. Their friend would never need to be alone for another full moon for the rest of their lives. They were his pack, such as it was. Brothers through thick and thin.

"Thanks," James said after a while.

"For what?"

"For never telling anyone about... you know."

Remus propped himself up on his elbows and turned his head to look at his friend. "We've all got secrets, Jamie," he said, using the name that James asked him to use only when they were alone and wouldn't be overheard. "Some more dangerous than others."

"Still..." James said, lifting his head some to adjust his arms which were just falling asleep under his head. "I appreciate it. One day, when I can adopt a kid, I'll name him after you."

"Oh yes. Wolf McWerewolf. A wonderful name."

"Your parents thought so. And that was before you got bitten," James laughed. "Merlin, even your dad's name-"

"I am Wolf McWerewolf the second, son of Wolf McWerewolf. He, too, comes from the proud and long line of McWerewolf," Remus joked. "You should see my father's family tree. So many different names for wolves. It's like looking at one of those muggle animal charts Evans is so fond of."

"Hey! You promised not to mention her for a whole month!"

"Sorry..."

James ginned though. "It is pretty funny when you think about it though. It's almost like your dad's family was begging for some werewolf to come along and give them a bite or two with names like that. And when one finally does they get mad about it."

They went from the weird naming conventions of Remus's family to what Sirius and Peter must be having to do in detention with Filch. Probably cleaning the trophy room again.

Eventually, the other two boys showed up, complaining and smelling of muggle cleaners. The four friends made their way back to the castle once Sirius was done lamenting what the lemon scent always did to his fabulous hair.

**o0o**

He knew he shouldn't have been going at Snape so hard lately. But... he didn't know what came over him really. Jealousy, maybe.

Which is why he didn't argue when Evans stormed into the common room that evening, asked Alice and Frank to hold her books, and then punched him square in the nose with righteous fury in those bright, angry green eyes.

"Don't you EVER speak to me again you... you.... you disgusting little toe rag!" she snarled.

By the time tornado Lily had taken her books back and stormed up the steps to the girls dorm, Peter was at his side, trying to help him stop the blood coming out of his broken nose.

"What the hell did Potter do now?!" came a shout from one of the younger years.

"Mind your own business, McLaggen!" Sirius snapped before turning to Remus. "You're a prefect! Do something!"

"I-"

"I had it coming," James said, his admission of guilt surprising anyone that heard it. "Remus, will you help me get to the infirmary? I think I might pass out. She hits really hard for a girl."

**o0o**

The Marauders targeted Snape even harder after that for the rest of the year. Evans wouldn't even speak to James, let alone stay in the same room unless they were forced to be there for classes. Remus seemed torn at times between his friends and his prefect duties. Of the four he was also, prior to the breaking of James's nose, the only one on decent terms with Lily Evans.

Now though... she treated him with the same contempt she treated the other three.

**o0o**

It was raining the night Sirius fell out of the floo during dinner.

"Padfoot!" James exclaimed, rising from his seat at the table and rushing to the boy coughing and sobbing on the floor. "Paddy? Paddy what-" and when he made his best friend look at him, he saw two black eyes and gashes all over his swollen, purple face.

"James?" the boy managed to groan through swollen lips.

"Twist! Mist! Get some healers! Quickly!" James shouted as he pulled Sirius close, not caring that he was getting blood all over his shirt. Fleamont got up and hurried from the table to help him carry Sirius to the nearest room with something soft to lay him on. Once he was down, Fleamont began checking him over, casting spell after spell to find out what was wrong with the boy.

"James, take your mother and go upstairs. Prepare one of the guest rooms for your friend."

"I can help! Let me help!"

"NOW JAMES!" Fleamont thundered, causing the injured boy to flinch and whimper at the sound. James did not need to be told a third time. He turned and left the room, rushing back to the dining room as quickly as he could. The healers were just rushing by, following the two distressed house elves that James had called on when Sirius tumbled out of the floo.

It took some doing, but James finally got his mother upstairs to the second floor, and into the nearest room – his father's study. James hadn't felt this scared since the first time his dad took him out in public. Not since Remus had found him in the showers and discovered his darkest secret.

James clung to his mother, feeling like that upset, scared 5 year old girl again for the first time in years instead of the 16 year old boy he was. At some point one of the other house elves had come and Euphemia gave the elf quiet instructions about setting up a guest room on her side of the manor so she could better keep an eye on Sirius in the coming days.

**o0o**

It was harder to keep the secret once Sirius was better able to get around on his own again. He never talked about what had happened to him other than to say he'd kill himself before he'd ever go back to his parents' house. James was thankful that Sirius seemed off in his own world most of the time, but he had come close to barging in on James in on James at the worst possible moments.

One such was when he was in the bath. Thankfully there were a lot of bubbles – mostly muscle relaxants added to the water since his father's potion really took its toll on his body every time he had to take the disgusting thing. That and his body was submerged up to the neck.

Sirius didn't seem to care and rolled his eyes as he put the toilet lit down and sat, propping his feet up on the side of the bath and lounging there while he complained about whatever it was on his mind at the time. The entire time James was praying the bubbles didn't all pop before Sirius left otherwise he'd have some really awkward explaining to do.

Eventually, the poor bastard started waxing poetic about what Remus's bum looked like in a pair of jeans, James sighed. "Not that I don't mind hearing about how much you want to shag our best friend, I was trying to have a wank here before you came thundering in!"

"In the bath?"

"Of course in the bath! Bloody hell, Padfoot! Can't a man have a bath and a wank in peace?!"

"I could give you a hand-"

"Like hell you will! Get out and go have your dirty fantasies about Moony's bum somewhere else. He's the last thing I want on my mind when I'm thinking about that angry perfect Amazon of mine!"

Sirius's laughter was like a large dog's bark. "She'd be more likely to break your nose again than look at you!" the other boy said, still laughing. "Y'know, if I look close enough I can still see where the bone was nearly poking through-"

"Shut it you! And lock the door behind you, you wanker!"

**o0o**

His parents were fighting again. Sirius and James had been out most of the day getting their school supplies for sixth year. They'd met up with Remus and Peter at Diagon Alley for lunch and to make plans for the start of the term.

"I thought your parents actually loved each other," Sirius had said when he and James had retreated to Sirius's room after dinner. "Couldn't tell it by the look of 'em today."

"They do this about once a year," James said as he sorted through the pranking supplies they'd bought. "You get used to it."

"Why though?"

James shrugged. He wanted to tell him. He really did. But before Sirius had even healed up all the way his father had warned him to keep his mouth shut and his secret buried. "Don't know," James lied. "Whatever started it was bad enough it made my mum move across the house to get away from him."

"That's how it starts. Next thing you know they'll be hexing each other's lovers."

"They still love each other. They're not like your parents, Padfoot. They just... mum just can't forgive my dad for something he did a long time ago. They're both stubborn as a hippogriff."

"So that's where you get it."

James laughed. "They'll be fine again in a few days. You'll see."

**o0o**

A few days later, things were not fine.

Sirius had gone to visit Remus. It was the day after a full moon. James was supposed to go as well, but his father said he needed to talk to him about something important. "Heir's business, you understand Sirius."

Sirius more than understood. He'd thankfully managed to get out of any important Heir duties when he managed to snatch his mother's floo powder jar and flung himself into the kitchen fireplace when she thought he was finally unconscious.

"I've perfected the potion," Fleamont had said to James when he sat down in the study across from his father once Sirius was well on his way to the Lupin's house. "When you return from Hogwarts for Yule, you will take it and you will finish the change we started when you were five."

"What?! No!"

"James-"

"I said NO!" James shouted, getting up out of the chair and heading for the door. When he got there, he found it locked. "Let me out of here right now!"

"Sit down and listen to me!"

"I will not! Is this what you and mum fought about this time? This... this... This stupid obsession you have with making me into something I'm not!"

"I did this to protect you-"

"No you did this because you didn't want to marry me off to a Malfoy!"

"Do you have any idea what kind of people they are? What kind of man Abraxas Malfoy is?! He's raised his son exactly the same!"

"Can't be much worse than you!"

When Sirius came home after lunch he found James sitting on the roof just outside his bedroom window. He climbed up there and joined him. He didn't comment on the large red hand mark across James's face or the puffiness of his eyes.

Though Sirius was amused as hell when he spotted Fleamont Potter later in the day with a black eye and a bandage across his cheek where he was sure Mrs. Potter's engagement ring really caught him good.

**o0o**

Sixth year for James was hell. His parents weren't speaking to each other since the incident when his father slapped him and his mother repaid the favour, turning to James and saying confidently, "Remember this if nothing else, my sweetling. Your father may be a Potter, but your mother is a Carrow. We are petty, hold grudges for centuries, and will do anything in the defense of our children."

Sirius lamented that James was mellowing out, and for some reason was always suspicious that he and Remus were up to something constantly. Remus joked that Sirius was just jealous they were spending so much time together instead of sneaking about and getting into trouble.

"He thinks Library is code for some weird sex thing," James had said during one of their study sessions. "I had to spend nearly all summer listening to him talk about your bum."

"What?"

"It's true. Just put him out of his misery and ask him to go to Hogsmede next weekend."

"Fine. But only if you ask Evans."

"She'd sooner punch me."

Remus shrugged. "At least it would be entertaining to watch."

"See if I give you anymore of my mum's home-made chocolates!"

**o0o**

Sirius was very happy to go to Hogsmede with Remus.

Peter laughed when Evans slapped James across the face hard enough it was heard by the Slytherins across the great hall.

James stood staring after her, pride wounded and slightly relived she hadn't accepted because he honestly hadn't really thought beyond "Hey Evans, want to go with me to Hogsmede this weekend?"

**o0o**

Yule was... tense. Even Sirius noted it. Euphemia still wasn't speaking to her husband more than a few words, and only because James or Sirius would be in the room. Fleamont was just as stubborn.

Two days before the Ministry Yule Ball, both his parents called him to his father's study and locked the door behind them. Because Sirius had been caught snooping in on family secrets, Euphemia herself put up the privacy charms to ensure nothing would escape that room.

"I believe, Fleamont, you have something to say to our daughter," she had said imperiously, her hands folded in her lap and her position in her chair turned slightly towards Jamie.

"I-"

"And mean it," Euphemia added firmly.

"What I have done to you for the last ten years is reprehensible."

"And?" she added.

"And while it was done with the best of intentions you were right."

"About?..."

He glared at his wife. "About my disappointment in not having a son. And my desire to avoid fulfilling the debt this family owes to the Malfoy family by marrying my daughter to their son."

Euphemia nodded, and turned more to James with a sad smile. "And I'm sorry for allowing this to go on. Despite my objections, I helped him and by doing so contributed to the abuse you have suffered."

James stared at his mother, then turned to his father. "Can..." he started quietly. "Can it be... reversed?"

"We don't know."

"You fed me potions for years!" James exclaimed angrily. "Not knowing exactly what it would do! I spent days afterwards in agony as it... it... took my insides and changed them! And you're telling me you can't fix it?!"

"We can try-"

"No! No more trying! I'm sick of being some... some experiment! I'm sick of being something I'm not! You find a way to fix this or... Or I will!"

**o0o**

James spent the entire next term practically living the library. He used his cloak to sneak into the restricted section looking for anything and everything he could to fix what his father had done to him. What his mother had blamed herself – rightfully so – for allowing him to do.

All he could find was a potion that while it would change a girl to a boy, permanently, it was extremely dark in nature. Not only was it dark, it tended to kill people that tried it. And of those that survived, the book said, it didn't entirely work.

James recalled an argument he overheard his parents having when he was around 5 or 6. His mother had told his father that if he used whatever it was on their daughter, she wouldn't be able to have children of her own later. This, James thought, might have been what they were fighting about. What his father had been working on trying to recreate all these years. Trying to make it safer without actually knowing it if would be safe or not until James took it and he could be... observed. The changes catalogued. The differences in batches noted down for further study and development.

It disgusted him, now that he was able to see what such a potion was like. What it called for. What it did....

How desperate his father truly was.

He'd told Remus a few days after finding that one. The boy wanted to hop on a broom and fly straight to Potter Manor and really show Lord Potter what Remus thought of that and of him.

James was grateful for the sentiment, but it really didn't help the situation.

"You know... We could go to the aurors-"

"No! I hate my father but I'd never... No. No. I couldn't do that to my mother. For some reason she still loves the bastard. It would break her heart to see him go to Azkaban. I'll just.... I'll find a way around this just like everything else."

**o0o**

Remus encouraged James to ask Evans out again at the first Hogsmede weekend after winter break.

This time, she didn't slap him, but... "I bring a friend and you bring a friend. NOT Black," she insisted. "Lupin or Pettigrew are acceptable."

"Really?"

"Provided you don't do anything to make me regret this between now and Saturday, yes Potter."

**o0o**

James picked Peter. He seemed the least offensive of his group of friends and least likely to provoke Evans into punching him. He wasn't surprised that she'd asked Alice to come with her, though Alice lamented it since she'd been hoping to go with her boyfriend Frank Longbottom.

They'd done a bit of shopping in the morning, James catching Lily by surprise with a suggestion they go to the book store rather than Zonko's as he'd usually do with his friends on a Hogsmede trip. Alice and Peter hung back, placing bets between them on when Lily was likely to slap James again and storm off.

He again surprised her when they went past the apothecary and he had stopped to admire the new line of cauldrons in the window. "You actually like this sort of thing?" she'd asked him. James had shrugged.

"Kind of hard not to when you dad's an inventor. He's created all sorts of potions," James said. "His most famous one is the Sleekeazy hair potion."

"No way your father invented that!"

"He did," James said, grinning. "When he was my age, his hair stuck up in all sorts of crazy angles. My mum refused to be seen in public with him until he did something about it. So one day he shows up outside the Ravenclaw common room in nothing but slippers and a bathrobe with this slime all in his hair and shouts through the portrait for her to go to Hogsmede with him now that he had his hair under control."

"Did it work?"

"Of course not! He had green slime all in his hair!"

Lily laughed, covering her mouth when she'd started to snort unflatteringly.

James chuckled. "She said he walked around with bright pink hair for months afterwards. But he got there in the end."

"See," Lily said between laughs. "THAT is the kind of thing I like to hear about. Not whatever latest prank you and your idiot friends have pulled on the Slytherins lately."

"I mean, some of our pranks are pretty funny."

"Most of them are quite cruel to the people you do them to," she said, watching as James's face fell. "But I'm glad I agreed to come with you today. I never would have known you liked potions otherwise. I quite like potions as well."

"I know. You're one of the best in the class. No one comes close to you other than Remus. And no one's better than you except Snape."

Lily's eyes widened then as James shoved his hands in his pockets. "You're actually admitting Severus Snape is better than you at something?"

"Shhh.... not so loud," he said. "Otherwise he might find out and get a swollen head about it or something. And then Sirius will never let me hear the end of it."

**o0o**

That first Hogsmede weekend turned into another. And another.

By the time the term had ended, it was common to see Potter trailing after Evans, arms filled with her books and the sappiest expression on his face.

"I almost wish I hadn't encouraged either of them," Remus had muttered one day when Sirius had just completed eight consecutive hours of complaining that James never had time for his brothers anymore.

Peter had heard him though. "You convinced Evans to go out with him?"

"What was I supposed to do? The poor idiot's spent nearly every day since we got in the boats as firsties obsessed with the girl! So I.... bribed her into giving him a pity date. That way when she told him it wasn't going to work out he'd let go and move on."

Sirius gasped, holding his hand to his chest dramatically while his other pointed at Remus. Sirius was standing on the end of his bed, one foot resting on the footboard while the rest of him was standing on the mattress. "YOU! YOU DID THIS!"

"HOW WAS I SUPPOSED TO KNOW SHE'D LIKE HIM BACK?!"

"YOU INTRODUCED YOKO ONO TO OUR JOHN LENON!"

Peter frowned. "What?"

"It's a muggle thing," Remus said tiredly as Sirius continued to shout at him. "Dorcas let Sirius borrow her muggle music player and he hasn't shut up about the band she had him listen to since."

**o0o**

A week after the end of 6th year, Euphemia came to James's room and erected her special privacy charms so they could speak of... delicate matters.

She gave James a box with two potions in them. Each one appropriately labelled in her own handwriting.

"Since we spoke last during winter holiday," she said. "I have worked with your father on a... well, it's not exactly a way to reverse it. We've tested this on animals first, taking a sample from every single version of the potion your father gave you to make sure we had some that were... different like yourself."

"Oh dear Merlin-"

"And then we created these two potions. One will... complete the change and make you more... masculine in nature."

"It'll make a man out of me?"

"Yes," his mother said. Then she pointed out the other in the box. "This one, however, will halt anything that is still... changing from the last dose you took."

"What does that mean?"

"It means that each year, your father's potion built upon the one before it. Changing a little at a time and fine tuning things so to speak. His final version was meant to finish the job."

"So the first one is what? The one he made and wanted me to take last Yule?"

"Yes."

"Does it work?"

"Unfortunately. But there are side effects. You will never sire children of your own. It cannot be undone. And if you were to attempt to do so, it will likely kill you."

James sat quietly, holding the box in his lap and hadn't realized he'd started crying until his mother came closer and wiped at his face with her handkerchief.

"The other one... will I.... Would I be able to... if I found a man that maybe..."

"I don't know. So far... So far the mice we've been using haven't... the ones fed the second one have been able to get with child, Jamie. But we haven't been able to get them to STAY with child."

"So either way I..." James wiped his face. "Either way I probably won't ever..."

"Nothing I can say will ever make this okay. And neither your father or I deserve or expect any forgiveness from you. I am sorry that all I can do is far too little far too late."

James reached into the box and selected one of the potions. "This one," he said. "Will you have Twist and Mist draw up a bath for me? I'd like to get this out of the way as soon as possible before Sirius starts pestering me about missing Remus again."

Euphemia nodded, leaning down to kiss her child's temple and run fingers through that unruly birds nest of black.

**o0o**

Sirius was told that James wasn't feeling well, and in truth, he wasn't.

He was angry and in pain. The muscle relaxant potion baths could only do so much to ease the pain of his insides attempting to correct themselves as best as they could. Every time he ate he wanted to vomit as years and years worth of potions were trying to leave his system.

After over a week of pain, sweat, vomit, and more pain, James was finally able to stand up without wanting to faint. Able to eat light foods without vomiting it right back up.

His mother was right in that it couldn't reverse what was done. But it had done enough. His skin was slightly softer. The hair on his legs and genitals a little less coarse and wiry. His shoulders were still too broad and his chest still flat as a board. He still had the lean muscles that years of playing Quidditch had given him. His hips were a little wider though. Enough that he had to have the elves tailor his trousers a bit to make them fit right again.

The most noticeable change, however, came a few nights later.

Now, James wasn't an idiot.

He knew what the other boys got up to in the dorms at night. Or in the showers when nobody was around. For fuck's sake he had walked in on Padfoot and Moony going at it like rabbits a week before term ended and had stood there clapping and cheering them on because "FINALLY! Took you idiots long enough!"

He knew how babies were made and was pretty sure he at least knew the mechanics of his own equipment worked even if he'd never had the desire to... give it a tickle as he'd heard Dorcas call it.

But damn if he didn't wake up panting with wet boxers and a dampness between his legs that wasn't going away any time soon after dreaming of Lily Evans doing some rather dirty things with her mouth that made him feel all kinds of things he'd not had to deal with before.

**o0o**

That was a very long, very awkward conversation with his mother that ended with memorizing a recipe for a contraceptive potion he never expected to ever have to know.

But apparently, it was a good sign.

**o0o**

When James transformed into Prongs after taking that final potion, he still was... well... a rather imposing stag. Remus thought it odd that James was a stag at all, given that out of the other three marauders, he knew James wasn't actually a boy. At least, not entirely.

"Maybe..." Remus said as he and James lay in the same clearing of grass waiting for the same two friends to finish with a detention their third week of seventh year.

"Maybe what?"

"Maybe it's not what you are or aren't, but who you are."

"How so?"

"Well take Peter for example. He loves to eat, doesn't bathe as often as he should, and doesn't mind rolling around in the mud for a laugh. He'd make a great pig really. But he's not. He's a rat."

"So?"

"So.... maybe it's his personality the transformation relies on. I mean, he is kind of... skittish when he's on his own. And a little spineless."

"And he'll eat anything you give him."

"There's that.... yeah. And he's naturally sneaky."

"Huh.... Well, makes sense I suppose," James said as he adjusted his arms under his head. Hazel eyes followed the clouds as they slowly drifted across the sky. "What about Sirius?"

"A giant, mythical, obnoxious, loud death omen. Oh yeah, that's Sirius all over."

James couldn't help but laugh. "I don't know... he's more of a giant puppy really."

"Exactly! Short attention span. Loyal to those that earn his trust. Protective of those he considers family. And boy is he territorial. He caught me talking to one of the Slytherins about a class assignment in Runes one day and he shows up and just drapes himself all over me! It was the third day of classes!"

James couldn't help but laugh. "You're lucky that's all he did. Knowing Padfoot he'd probably climb under the desk in the middle of class and-"

"Why do you think he didn't drop History of Magic? Everyone knows Binns never pays attention to anything going on around him."

"He did not seriously... oh Merlin who am I kidding! Of course he did!" James exclaimed as his shoulders shook with laughter. When both boys had finally settled down, James propped himself up on his elbows, watching the path into the clearing for their friends. They should be getting out of detention any time now.

"What about me then?" he asked. "Why do you think I still turn into a stag instead of a doe?"

"Because," Remus said. "Well... according to divination-"

"You know I don't believe that rot, Moony."

"I know, but it can sometimes be useful in making sense of weird things, you know. But... the stag is a protector. Some cultures see it as the king of the forest. They represent a lot of things, really. Swiftness, for one. And no one's faster on a broom than you are. And travel. You've always wanted to see the world one day."

"Yeah, but I don't obsess over those things."

"They're also an animal that's supposed to represent changes. Specifically," Remus said, looking at James from the corner of his eye for a little too long than was comfortable. "Shape changing," he said. "And death and rebirth, too," was added rather quickly.

"You think because of my... what my parents... that's why I might be a-"

"It's only an idea. And like you said, divination is-"

"No..." James said, sitting up all the way and crossing his legs in front of him. "No, I get it. I mean, lets face it, Moony might be the pack alpha, but everyone knows I'm the ringleader. The king, you might say."

James would think about this for a long time after, alone in his private room off the Head Boy and Head Girl suite.

**o0o**

They were doing the Patronus Charm again in DADA right before winter holiday. Moony had finally managed to get a wispy sort of shield. James had been at that level for weeks but was still unable to get it much further.

Sirius had gotten the shield straight away but suddenly, after a weekend to Hogsmede with Remus, the glowing, silvery wolf was running around all over the place in excitement.

Evans nearly got it, too. But it sputtered out at the last second when she caught sight of Snape glaring at her from across the classroom.

**o0o**

Remus had been allowed to come with Sirius and James over the winter holiday because there wasn't a full moon. Euphemia was thrilled to have him, and Fleamont was... concerned.

James and Fleamont got into an argument, one that Remus's keen hearing wouldn't let him avoid. Fleamont went alone to the Ministry ball that year. No Euphemia. No James.

Sirius had quietly explained to Remus when James wasn't around that, "Mr. and Mrs. Potter are... they're not bad people, exactly. They just... It's not really easy to live with them when they get like this about James."

"Are they always like this when he's home?"

"Sometimes. Usually not around the holidays. Though last year was pretty bad."

"Why, what happened-"

"I don't know. They won't tell me and James won't say," he said. "Hey, lets tell James the good news. It might help cheer him up some."

**o0o**

"You're WHAT?!"

"We eloped!"

"Yeah, I got that!" James said, looking from one Marauder to the other. "What the hell! Is that why you suddenly could make a patronus out of nowhere?!"

Sirius grinned hugely while Remus tried to hide in his oversized sweater.

"And where the hell was your best friends when you two went off and... and..." James flailed his arms around.

"Eloped," Sirius said, showing off the ring he wore on a chain around his neck. "Well, you were busy sucking face with Evans and Peter was.... hell, we don't know WHERE Peter was. We looked all over the castle for him. Even used the map and couldn't find him."

"And who the hell was crazy enough to stand by and let the two of you do this?!"

"Well..." Sirius started, rubbing the back of his neck as Remus sighed. "My mother," Remus said. "It was... well... Remember that full moon Sirius offered to go check on me and he didn't come back until two days later?"

"....Yes...."

"My mum caught us shagging in the basement."

"No!"

"Usually I'm.... rather loud on full moon nights and when she didn't hear anything she came down to check that the cage was still... well... intact and that I hadn't escaped. Again."

"Oh dear Merlin! Not as Moony and Padfoot! Please don't tell me she caught you," James pleaded, covering his bright red face with both hands. "Please please please don't tell me she caught you two stuck together like that!"

"Oh she definitely got an eye full," Sirius beamed.

Remus had enough sense to be embarrassed about it. "She wanted to know how he snuck in without setting off my parents alarms. And then she said she didn't want to see him again unless he's come to make an honest man of me."

James was shaking with laughter.

"You should have seen his dad's face when she made us tell him. I had to sit through a twelve hour lecture of how to properly control and care for a werewolf. It was worse than being stuck in Binn's class!" Sirius complained.

Remus sighed and shook his head. "Why does he have to be so pretty and dumb?"

Sirius shoved him. "Is that any way to talk about your darling, devoted, handsome new husband Moony?"

"We can't all land someone as perfect as Lily," James said, his sour mood forgotten for just a little while.

**o0o**

James wouldn't know it until after his father's death a few years later, but before that school break was over, Remus J. Lupin had himself a few words with Lord Potter about the way he treated his only daughter. He got loud. He got angry. And he wasn't afraid, for the first time in many years, to let Moony do most of the talking for him when he did.

By the time he got done with Fleamont Potter, there was no doubt in the man's mind that he'd sooner face Azkaban than his daughter's werewolf friend on the night of a full moon.

Euphemia made her special chocolates for Remus to take back to school with him after she'd got a talking to, less vicious but equally as angry with her.

The chocolates, Remus knew, were meant to be a peace offering. One that he accepted since she, at least, was actually remorseful for her part in things whereas he could smell the stink of regret at getting caught coming off James's father.

**o0o**

The boys hadn't been entirely carefree during their school years.

As they had gotten older, the world around them was changing, and not for the better.

When they weren't stressing over tests, relationships, pranks and detentions, or Quidditch, the newspaper was filled with the latest attacks from the rising dark lord's faction. Or headlines about new dark creature restrictions put into place. Remus was usually very quiet after reading about another consultation his father had been called to make for the Ministry. A stark reminder that his father worked in the very office that was meant to keep people like him under control... or exterminate them when they couldn't.

A war was brewing – raging – and it was clearer as they got older who was on which side of it. By the time they were ready to leave Hogwarts, Cygnus Black had already married his daughter Narcissa off to Lucius Malfoy, who promptly forced her to quit her healer training. Sirius agonized about it for weeks afterwards because of the scandal behind the scenes. His cousin Andromeda had run off with a muggleborn after learning her father had tried to sell her off to the Malfoys.

"Cissa looks dead inside," he'd said of the photo in the paper. "Like a Dementor's just come along and sucked the life right out of her!"

James was just glad it wasn't him forced to stand there and wear a painted smile for the society pages. He still hated his father, true. But after hearing even just rumours of what Lucius got up to at Hogwarts... well... He didn't think some of those girls were ever going to recover from what he did to them.

James studied harder than ever before. Even Sirius got serious about his grades – after winter break of course. As the Dark Mark filled the front pages of the Daily Prophet day after day, the pair had made a pact. They'd get the best damn scores on their NEWTs that they could and get into the Auror program. They'd do their part to protect as many people as they could from this supposed Dark Lord and his crazy followers.

**o0o**

NEWTs were over.

The Marauders had nothing left to do for the rest of term but sit in classes they no longer needed and lounge around the grounds. James still had his Head Boy duties of course, but other than that there was very little responsibility for him to deal with. Remus was still a prefect, so they'd do rounds together usually while Sirius and Peter got up to no good.

This particular early summer day, a week before the train to leave Hogwarts for the final time, James got a summons to the infirmary. Confused, he made his excuses to his friends and went along his way.

When he got there he was surprised to see his mother speaking quietly with Madame Pomfrey. There was a sudden, sinking feeling in his gut as he slowed his approach, dragging his feet until finally he was close enough to be noticed.

"Mum, what are you doing here?"

"Ah, James, darling. I was asked by Madame Pomfrey to come for a meeting. It seems you've sent an application to the Ministry for Auror training, dear?"

"Y...yes. What does this have to do with-"

"Why don't we step into my office, Mr. Potter. I'm quite certain you wouldn't want this... delicate matter to be overheard."

James frowned, looking from his mother's impassive face to the school matron as he tried to come up with an idea of what this could be about.

**o0o**

Two hours later he was let go with a couple of new spells to practice and a face as red as a tomato.

"You're not the first one to come through my infirmary with your peculiar... biology, James," Madame Pomfrey had told him once they had total privacy. "And you're not the first that's going to need to trick their way past the required physical examinations for Auror training. If you manage to get past that, you'll need to keep it up for the annual physicals. As well as-"

"You.... You KNEW?!"

"Of course I knew dear child. It's my job to know so that I don't give you something that might be harmful to you. There's an entire class of potions and supplements that it's necessary to know which sex you were born as so that the ingredients in them don't damage your body, or worse, kill you."

"You haven't, I mean, nobody else-"

"No. But you will need to get yourself a private healer once you leave school. I have a few I can recommend. As I said, you're not the first special case I've had to deal with here. And you certainly won't be the last."

And so he had a list of spells to practice. A list of names to look into of trusted healers who had experience with 'people like him'. And a reminder not to land in her infirmary before the train to Hogwarts or so help her she'd keep him tied to the bloody bed until the morning of departure.

**o0o**

"I got in!" James exclaimed excitedly after ripping open the letter the owl had brought him. Sirius had gotten his acceptance letter the week before. James was with Lily when she'd gotten the letter back about an apprenticeship she'd applied for... Unfortunately, it wasn't such happy news as his.

Lily reached over and touched his arm. "May I see?"

"Yeah... Yeah of course!" James said, handing over the letter. "I can't believe it. I didn't think... I mean, with my potions scores I honestly thought they'd have turned me down."

Lily read over the letter and laughed before setting down on the table. "I think you'll find, James, that if you'd read a little further you'll have to take a crash course in potions alongside your regular training classes." She watched him pick up the letter again as she picked her spoon back up to take another bite of ice cream.

James's expression went from overly excited to disappointed and then to horrified as he read and re-read that part of the letter over again. "You'll help me study and practice potions, right?"

"What about your dad?" she asked.

"We... we're not on speaking terms at the moment," he said as he folded the letter and slipped it into a pocket inside his robe.

"James," she said to get his attention. She her spoon down again and reached over to take his hand that now rested again on the table between both of her own. "Yes. I'll help you. But you have to promise me something in return."

"You know I'd promise you anything. Especially when you look at me like that."

Lily smiled. "You have to meet my parents."

"What?"

"Well I'm certainly not going to your house every week to help you practice making your potions. And since my sister moved out and got married, my mum and dad have let me turn her bedroom into a workroom until I move out on my own. It's perfect and we won't have to worry about Sirius always kicking the bloody door down because he's bored or Remus is busy."

"I thought you were going to make me promise to do something silly like... like..."

"Like what?"

"I don't know!" James exclaimed, waving his free hand about. "Dress up like one of those silly muggle rock stars you like so much and prance about the Alley."

Lily laughed, and James loved to hear it. To watch the pull of her lips when she smiled and the light in her bright, brilliant green eyes as she tried to imagine it in her head. "I don't think-" she started, then couldn't help herself and snorted with her laughter in that ugly but adorable way James had always been so fond of. She quickly pulled her hands back and covered her face from the nose down as if that might stop herself.

"I don't think," she tried again. "Sequins and feather boas are your style, James," she finally got out. "But maybe Siri could give it a try!"

James couldn't stop himself from joining her laughter. "Oh Merlin! Remus would kill us for putting that idea in his head!"

Lily uncovered her face and had a wicked smile. "Let's do it! I'm sure I can find something he'd wear and could you imagine the look on his mother's face when she finds out he strutted about like a proud peacock in gaudy, glittery muggle costumes?"

They spent the rest of their date plotting and planning on when, not how, to get Sirius to strut his stuff down Diagon Alley in a sequin top, far too tight spandex leggings, and the most tacky, gaudy feather boa Lily would be able to find.

**o0o**

Mr. and Mrs. Evans didn't know what to make of the young man Lily had brought home near the end of July 1978.

They had, of course, been told by Lily that she'd been seeing a young man at school the last year and a half. It wasn't as much of a bad thing as it was a surprise since she'd never really shown interest in boys before. That and the one she was introducing to them was one she had spent years complaining about every summer and in many a letter home to her family.

"Mum, dad," Lily had said when she came inside with him from the back garden – the spot she usually came and went when she was using magic to do so. It was private and hidden from the nosey muggle neighbours they had. "This is James Potter, my boyfriend. James, these are my parents, Hyacinth and William Evans."

Their first afternoon was... awkward. James was nervous and Lily's father kept a close eye on him while her mother was asking so many questions it was hard to keep up.

"The only other magical person they've met is Severus," Lily had said once they were able to escape to Lily's workroom so he could study what they'd gone over in his extra potions course that week. "And you know how he can be."

"Yeah..." he said. "Can we not talk about Snape when I'm trying to work on this stuff? Or at all?"

"We could," she said as she took the text book they had him using in class and flipped through it, tutting to herself and frowning. "Or we can use some of this time to sort out why you don't like my best friend."

"You're still friends with him?"

"Of course I am. What gave you the idea that I wasn't?"

"Well for one, he's a bigoted anti-muggle blood supremacist-"

"He isn't and you don't know a damn thing about him, James. Now, most of the stuff they have in here is based on the crap books we had in school. So instead while you're here, you're going to be working with this alongside it." James watched as Lily went to her bookshelf and pulled out a thick muggle looking binder. She came back and set it down in front of him, opening to the first page. He was right, it was a muggle binder. With lined paper and filled with two different sets of handwriting.

"What's this?"

"It's a book Severus and I are working on together," she said simply. "The first of several we hope. We're rewriting the entire seven years worth of texts from the ground up. This is First Year Potions. Get reading and I'll prepare a demonstration."

James groaned. Well... he did bring this on himself by asking her to tutor him...

**o0o**

James and Sirius stood staring at the smouldering ruins of their home.

It had been burning for a week straight and showed no signs of stopping.

"The paper says they died of Dragon Pox," Sirius said, glaring at the sky where just a week before the dark mark hung heavy overhead. "Dragon Pox my arse."

"The last thing I ever said to the man was that I hoped he died in a cauldron explosion."

"I know," Sirius said, draping an arm across James's shoulders. "I was there."

"My mum never got to meet Lily," he said.

Sirius's smile didn't reach his eyes. "They'd have gotten along like a house on fire," he said, wincing when he realized what he'd said. "I mean-"

"No, you're right..." James said softly. "I think... I think I'll take the headmaster up on his offer after all," he said.

"Really?"

"Yeah. You?"

"After what those bastards did to Moony's mother? Do you even have to ask?"

James looked down at the ring he was given that morning by the goblins. The weight of its burden was one he never wanted to carry. He knew he might be the last to ever carry it. His father's twisted idea of protection had forced him to take up the mantle of Lord Potter. And he hated it.

**o0o**

Prongs had moved in with Padfoot and Moony. He got a few days off from training to put his Family Affairs in order.

That was back in September.

It was November now, and he was nervous as a kitten.

Remus had some reservations about his plan, but Sirius was all for it. Peter... no one saw much of Peter these days. Then again James and Sirius had reached the more intense part of their training. And when they weren't doing that, they were stuck in meetings with Dumbledore and the Order. Being sent out to help fight the bad guys.

"Are you sure this is a good idea, James?" Remus asked him again. "It's a big step. And we're not been out of Hogwarts for long-"

"Says the man that ran off and eloped in 6th year without telling his best friends!"

"Hey! He told me!" Sirius barked.

"You're the one he ran off with, you don't count!" James shouted back.

"Okay, but are you absolutely sure?" Remus said, his eyes saying a hell of a lot more than his words could when Sirius was around.

"Yes."

"And if she says no?"

"Then she says no and I'll lay around on the sofa eating chocolate ice cream and moping about for the rest of my life."

"Prongs-"

"Look guys," he said, holding the velvet box he'd gotten from the family vault days earlier. "I have never been more certain of something in my entire life. And that includes being friends with a couple of idiots like you. I'm going to ask Lily to marry me, and Merlin willing she says yes."

"And then what?" Remus asked.

"I haven't thought that far ahead but I'm certain I'll come up with something."

**o0o**

James hadn't really thought that far ahead. He got as far as "Ask the most perfect creature on Earth to marry me" and then completely ignored the fact that, well, he'd have to come clean about some pretty heavy dark family secrets hiding in his pants. Or lack thereof.

But none of that seemed to even remotely cross his mind as he rented the muggle cabin. As he ordered the fancy dinner and had Remus help him take it to the cabin since the house elves died along with his parents back in September. He was blissfully ignoring the problem as he arranged the most romantic evening he could possibly imagine, just the two of them, so he could propose to the only person he'd ever loved.

And it had been a wonderful day, too. Lily liked to take long walks in the woods – usually because she liked to spend the time seeking out new ingredients for the potions she and Snape experimented with. But also because, as she had awkwardly told him on one of the dates in the early days of their relationship, she found the solitude peaceful. The way she'd described it to him reminded him of how he felt when he was flying. Not even playing Quidditch but just... grabbing his broom and taking to the air for hours just... existing without a care or worry in the world.

So they'd gone hiking, and Lily couldn't help but explain different plants – both muggle and magical – to him as they went along the winding paths through the forest. And James couldn't get enough of listening to her. If she still couldn't get someone to apprentice her in Charms, she'd make an excellent teacher.

What followed was a series of events that when James would recount it to Remus later would be the cause of great confusion, relief, laughs, and embarrassment. And not particularly in that order every time it's retold.

Lily, after their hike, and said she was going to go take a shower to freshen up before slipping into something more comfortable. That, was perfectly normal and expected.

What was not expected was Sirius's patronus bounding in right through the wall of the shower as Lily is in there, on it's way to find James. This caught Lily by surprise which caused her to slip in the shower. Hearing her shout, James went rushing into the bedroom of the cabin, to which the bathroom was attached, intending to make sure she was alright.

Meanwhile Sirius's patronus is jumping about being obnoxious because James isn't paying it any attention. When James gets to the shower, Lily is just standing up and bracing herself against the wall when James gets an eyeful of something he did not expect.

"That's... that's a...."

"James, I can explain!"

"That's a penis!"

And before she can explain, Sirius's patronus pops up in the shower, again, and finally getting James's attention starts to pass along the message it's brought him. So Lily, frantically trying to get a towel or a robe or something to cover herself is hearing Sirius Black's patronus, in her shower, asking, "So has she told you no way in hell yet or did the crazy woman actually say yes?"

James, meanwhile had fled from the bathroom, through the bedroom, and is hyperventilating in the cabin's kitchen.

This is where Lily finds him. Her hair is still a bit soapy from the shampoo. She's got a big fluffy bath robe transfigured from a towel wrapped around her and she's dripping on the hardwood floor in the doorway. "James?"

And when James doesn't look up, Lily starts to cry. "James, please look at me."

And then he starts to laugh. And it's a strange, strangled sort of sound that puts her on edge.

"James-"

"You have no idea," James finally manages to say, lifting his face and Lily can see he's not angry. He's not even disgusted like she thought he'd be. "You have no idea how bloody RELIEVED I am!"

"What?"

"Lily, I've been so bloody worried what you might think that I... sort of... maybe... tried to pretend that I-"

"Just spit it out before punch you right in the nose!" Lily snapped, still crying.

"I'm a girl!"

"No you're not."

"I am so!"

"Liar!" Lily shouted back. "Don't you dare make fun of me James Potter!"

"I'm not! Honest!"

**o0o**

"And then James got to his feet," Lily said to Remus over coffee. "And you'd never believe what this idiot does. He undoes his belt and-"

"He didn't."

"He most certainly did. Dropped his trousers, pants and all. Right there in front of the fancy dinner he'd left under the warming charms."

Remus laughed into his cup as Lily reached over and stole one of his chocolate biscuits.

"I have to say, when you bribed me to just let him take me to Hogsmede that first time, I certainly never expected it to turn out like this."

"I did say he'd surprise you," Remus said. "So, when he asked, what did you tell him?"

Lily smiled. "Well after we spent most of the evening sitting on the sofa, crying our eyes out I... might have told him to ask me again when we hadn't been ugly crying for hours confessing our deepest and darkest secrets and cursing the day his father was born?"

"So that's a yes?"

"I never said that," Lily said, stealing another biscuit and changing the subject. "So what's this I hear about your and Sirius Black running away one Hogsmede weekend and eloping? I didn't even know two men could do that."

"Maybe not in the muggle world," Remus said, swatting her hand when she went for another of his chocolate biscuits. "And my... parents insisted on it." Before he could explain, Sirius and James walked in grinning ear to ear with their shiny new Auror badges pinned to their robes.

"Guess who just made Auror!" James exclaimed.

"These guys!" Sirius answered.

Remus sighed and shook his head, sipping his coffee as Lily clapped in congratulations for their idiot boys.

"Let's go out tonight to celebrate!"

"I can't, love. I'm meeting Severus before dinner to go over some revisions for our book and then I've got to go with my parents to Tunie's dinner party."

"And I promised Peter I'd watch over his mum tonight so he can go on a date. The old woman's not been well lately and he's worried to leave her by herself."

"Oh alright... tomorrow then! We don't officially start work until Monday."

"Tomorrow I'm tutoring the Wallace twins for their OWLs retests," Remus said apologetically. Lily reached over and patted his hand, mostly as a ploy to steal his last biscuit.

**o0o**

Firstly, James was shocked to see a doe patronus in their living room.

Secondly, he was thrilled to hear Lily's voice come out of it.

Thirdly, he frowned at the message he'd received from her.

He was relieved when Remus came home first. "You have to help me!" he pleaded with his friend.

"What did you do to make Lily angry this time?"

"It's not that..." James said, then slightly embarrassed added. "She's asked me to have dinner with her in muggle Cardiff tomorrow night."

"And?"

"And that I should pick out a really nice dress to wear."

"Oh dear Merlin..." Remus said with a sigh as he rubbed a hand down his face, resigning himself to the fact his pleasant afternoon of books, tea and chocolates was now going to be spent helping his hopeless best friend sort through yet another of his mini crises. "Oh alright then. Come on... Sirius won't be back for hours anyway. We'll go to Brighton. Nobody knows us in Brighton."

**o0o**

James dolled up pretty well, with help at least.

There was no way he was wearing heels and going to risk breaking his neck. Besides, he was already taller than Lily.

It had been years since he'd worn a dress. And had long hair. It had taken three hours to deal with the forest of hair that had come up when all he'd wanted to do was lengthen the hairs on his head. Remus had joked that at least he didn't have to deal with it once a month every month. "Do you know, sometimes I wake up the next day and find patches of the stuff in the oddest places..."

The restaurant was quite nice, if a little strange. Then again, it was a muggle place.

He'd walked right past Lily and hadn't even realized it until she was standing in the entrance of the restaurant and a woman was asking his name.

"Evans," said a familiar voice as a hand settled against James's lower back. "Table for two, six-thirty." As the hostess looked in her book, James turned his head to see a smiling man with short red hair looking back at him and the brightest green eyes he'd ever seen.

"You look lovely, Jamie," Lily said, beaming.

James glanced down below his girlfriend's neck briefly, confusion clear on his face.

"After dinner, love," Lily said as the hostess found the reservation and escorted the young couple to their table.

It was all a bit... surreal for James as he let Lily pull out the chair for him and gently push him forward before sitting down across from him. Ordering wasn't much different from a wizarding restaurant, though instead of having the food pop up on the table thanks to house elves, people brought their food and occasionally refilled their drinks.

Once they had their meals, and were guaranteed at least a little while of privacy, Lily put up some charms so they could talk. "Sorry if it's a bit... much. After that night I thought, maybe, it might be good for you to, you know, not have to pretend for a little bit."

"No... No, it's fine. It's... It's good. Thank you. I'm just a little surprised that's all. I mean, you're not... You chose to... I don't want you to be something you're not either just to make me feel better."

"It's fine, Jamie. For you, I can handle a night being Liliam from time to time. You need this and I just want you to be happy."

"Thank you," he said.

Later that night, Lily taught him the spell she used to give herself a rather nice rack every day, telling him Severus had learned about it from his mother and technically it's supposed to be used for new mothers who's breasts were too small to properly nurse their children but it was better than stuffing her bra with bathroom tissue.

**o0o**

When Sirius had walked in on James practising the charm to give himself breasts and saw he had one rather large one and one very tiny one, he'd laughed for days.

James had laughed it off claiming it was pranking research.

**o0o**

Jamie Potter and Liliam Evans ran off to Scotland and eloped in early January 1979 a week after Liliam got down on one knee in a muggle park and surprised Jamie with the same engagement ring that James had planned to give to Lily.

"How the hell did you even get this?!"

"Remus smuggled it to me when you weren't looking," Liliam had said, sliding it onto a finger with a smile. The muggles had all clapped.

Hyacinth and William Evans, after having Jamie's secret explained to them in a way that left out most of the trauma and abuse so they'd understand that James and Jamie were, in fact, the same person, had been rushed to Scotland to be witnesses for the young couple. Petunia wasn't even told.

Mr. and Mrs. Evans celebrated their wedding night in the same cabin that had been rented for the first attempt at a wedding proposal.

**o0o**

James Potter and Lily Evans had run off and eloped in mid February with Peter, Sirius, and Remus standing witness for them with the same official that had married Remus and Sirius.

Mr. and Mrs. Potter spent their second wedding night in their new home in Godric's Hollow. They hadn't any furniture yet but a mattress, but it was more than enough.

**o0o**

There was a standing rule in the Potter household.

Unless it's a life or death emergency, send a patronus or call ahead before just showing up.

Thankfully the first and only time Peter had caught them, he'd been with Remus at the time and they were able to play it off as, "James was experimenting with his pranking spells again. We're stuck like this until we can figure out a counter."

"You mean a general finite won't reverse it?"

"No because my genius husband was mucking about in my workroom when he did it and we got splashed with all manner of potions at the same time."

"Prongs how many times have we warned you..."

**o0o**

Every morning for over a week in mid December 1979, James had been hunched over the toilet before going to work. Unable to eat anything or keep anything he did eat down.

He refused to see a healer, even though he had one he trusted. And he refused to see a muggle doctor when Lily insisted.

So Lily did the only thing left she could think of...

When Remus stepped out of the floo he was seized instantly by the strong grip of Lily and dragged towards the living room where she pointed at the stairs. "He's up there and refuses to come out of the bathroom."

"What?"

"I've been trying to get him to see Healer Fowler or my own doctor for over a week and he's so damn stubborn-"

"Right... and you want me to what exactly?"

"Well, this is your pack isn't it? March up there and order him to see a doctor!"

"What makes you think he'll listen to me?"

She gave him a withering look and crossed her arms over her chest. "Really, Moony?"

It was moments like this he really regretted playing matchmaker for the two hopeless morons. "Alright alright... but you owe me. You know I don't like it when you play my own werewolf card against me."

When Remus found James in the master bathroom, curled around the toilet dry heaving into it, he sat on the side of the bath and sighed. Rubbing his temples he wrinkled his nose at the smell. "Jamie, listen to your wife and go see a healer."

"No!"

"Don't make me do it, Jamie."

"You can't make me!" It would have been more dramatic had he not grabbed for the toilet again and started heaving into it. "Oh Merlin, when will it stop!"

"In approximately eight or nine months," Remus said.

"What?!" And more heaving.

"You're pregnant you idiot!"

The raised voices had drawn Lily's attention, so she'd come upstairs to investigate. The only thing she'd caught clearly was the very last thing Remus had said.

Lily stood frozen in the doorway, looking from Remus to James and back again. "He's... We're... I.... He...."

"I think you broke her, mate," James said, finally feeling a little better and wiping at his mouth with a bit of tissue.

"How'd you-"

"As you two point out, I'm a werewolf. I can smell it on him. Jamie, if you won't see a healer, then let Lily take you to a muggle doctor. Might be a better idea to do that anyway if you don't want anyone to find out about... you know..."

"Merlin, the Malfoys would have kittens if they found out what my father did."

"Exactly."

**o0o**

A lot can be said about the Marauders. James was the ringleader, certainly. Sirius was the wild child. The risk taker. The more chaos and damage the pranks made the better. Petter was always the extra set of hands. The accomplice. The sidekick to whomever was pulling off the big job.

But Remus... Quiet, studious, rule abiding prefect Remus J. Lupin?

He was the most dangerous. Not because he was a werewolf.

But because he was the brains of the whole operation.

And he only ever got caught one time in the entire seven years the four boys spent together.

So when James started to show in January of 1980, it was once again to Remus Lily and James turned to help them sort out their problem.

"We need a way to hide the pregnancy," James had said. "And make it look like Lily's the one that's pregnant the entire time."

"It'll be tricky..." Remus said. "But I think I can manage it. How much time do you think you have before-"

"I don't know! Do I LOOK like I've ever been pregnant before?!"

"I could ask my mum and dad?" Lily offered with a shrug.

Remus sighed, leaned in and sniffed James before frowning. "You're about four months along. That's not much time to work with... And you've always been pretty fit so people are going to notice soon enough."

"Please, Remus. Anything you can come up with to help."

"You owe me, Potter."

"I know."

"Your mother's special chocolate recipe or you're on your own."

James sighed in relief. Lily smiled. "Hell, at this point I'm ready to give you my mum's secret hot cocoa recipe as well."

**o0o**

They had a little extra time than they had expected when James started to haemorrhage. Lily wasted no time getting him to the muggle doctor they'd been seeing. Not wanting to waste time by making herself look like her muggle world alter ego, she cast some glamours so she needn't be apart from James for longer than necessary.

He spent two weeks in the hospital, and Remus visited from time to time. Sirius had wanted to come, thinking it was Lily stuck in the hospital, but Remus had pointed out that "She's already been under enough stress. I'll make sure she knows you're worried about her though."

By the time James and Lily were able to go home, with James ordered on bed rest for a time to make sure he didn't have any further cause to return to the hospital, Remus had come up with a solution.

"Undetectable extension charms," he said, showing off the robe he'd been experimenting with. "All of his uniforms and robes will be charmed with them that way no one will ever see how big he's getting."

"Okay... but what about Lily? People are going to expect her to be... you know..."

Remus held up a sack with straps. "Working on it," he said. "For now, I'll have it tied to a monitoring charm that I can teach you. You'll have to recast it every day, and it'll grow in size to match your stomach. That way she looks a little more normal."

"I won't be able to wear those backless tops I like in the summer anymore!"

Remus stared at his friend as if she'd just said one of the dumbest things he'd ever heard, and he was married to Sirius Black so that was a pretty high bar to begin with. "I mean, you could, Lily. But how are you going to explain your fake baby belly?"

In the end, she gave up wearing her favourite backless tops as the weather got warmer.

**o0o**

Lily could have KILLED HIM for what he'd done.

"What was I supposed to do? He was RIGHT THERE!"

"Oh, I don't know, Jamie!" she shouted back at him as he pulled off his boots. "Maybe NOT throw a stunner at the Dark Fucking Lord!"

"He was about to kill Alice and Frank was trying to stop the Lestrange brothers from tearing up half of Diagon Alley!"

"And you're pregnant, Jamie! Or did you forget that! You shouldn't even be out in the field in your condition!"

"Well so is Alice!"

"If Alice wants to be reckless and get herself and her baby killed then that's her business!"

"You take that back!"

"I will not!"

Lily slept on the couch that night. And every night for the next three weeks.

**o0o**

Lily Potter joined the Order of the Phoenix, appearing to be six months pregnant, after having been out with Alice Longbottom doing a bit of baby shopping in Hangman's Bluff's otherwise calm and sensible wizarding district.

Lily Potter and Alice Longbottom were all that stood between certain death and the Dark Lord Voldemort that day.

There was only a single death, and that was a death eater who had the unfortunate pleasure of being crushed by a collapsing wall after a particularly overpowered Bombarda from Lily's wand.

She had been asked to join the organization, much to James's dismay, when Alice had noted to Albus Dumbledore that she was unusually powerful given her delicate condition. "Yes..." the kindly old headmaster had said. "Yes, I imagine so. Even with the strain of pregnancy on their magic, it's not unheard of for a muggleborn witch to be exceptionally powerful in times of great stress and extreme pressure..."

James didn't like the sound of that one bit.

Lily had accepted the offer, if only to keep a closer eye on James.

**o0o**

The false belly Remus had made was, at some point, replaced with a better one. This one allowed people to touch Lily's "belly" and feel the baby kicking, as the monitoring charm he'd invented for his friends was improved upon.

James had been relegated at work, at some point along the way, to desk jockey. Not that he minded at all. His boss had complained about it though by saying, "I wouldn't do it if not for the fact I've been on the wrong end of Lady Potter's right hook. And that was before the hormones made her crazy. You get a paper-cut and she's likely to storm in here, pregnant and all, and burn the ministry to the ground."

It didn't stop James from sneaking out sometimes and going on a solo mission for the Order.

It was on one such mission that he found out Severus Snape was working as a spy for the order. He'd been too slow and took a hex to the knee and went down.

Only for Snape to notice where his hands went for when he fell.

Next thing he knew, he was waking up on his couch in Godric's Hollow, Lily sitting with his head in her lap, crying her eyes out and Severus glaring at him from a chair nearby while Remus frantically trying to reassure Sirius through the floo that James was fine and he needn't come through.

"I knew you were a moron, Potter," Snape said darkly. "But I didn't think you were entirely brainless."

"Severus stop it."

"I knew you were crazy for marrying that... that... inconsiderate-"

"I said ENOUGH!" Lily snapped angrily, causing James to wince at her shouting so close to his ear while he had a headache. "What's done is done."

"Do you two have any idea what this means? All this time I thought you were faking it to help protect the Longbottoms."

Lily frowned as she stroked James's hair. "What do you mean, Sev?"

"You don't know? I had assumed he told the entire Order."

"told us-"

"Guys, I have to go. If I don't see to Sirius he's going to come barging in here and i don't think fisticuffs with Snape is the thing James needs to be dealing with right now," Remus said tiredly.

"Thank you, Lupin, for helping me get the dumbest of your friends out of there without blowing my cover."

Remus gave a small nod and a shrug, knowing that was going to be the only thanks he was going to get out of the man. "If you two need anything, anything at all-"

"We'll be in touch Remus. Thank you for bringing Jamie back to me in one piece."

Once Remus was gone, and the floo locked down for the night, Severus tried his best to calm himself down.

"What didn't Albus tell us, Severus?"

"There's a prophecy. I managed to hear part of it before I was caught and kicked out. Unfortunately, being in the position that I am, I couldn't go back to the dark lord empty handed or he'd kill me. No one there trusts me and it's hard to get information for the Order as it is. I manage to skim by because of my skills in potions and the... creative use of my time in school devising darker than average spells. But he's been getting impatient with me and I couldn't risk going back and getting tortured again without something to show for it."

"Divination is bullshit," James muttered from where he lay on the sofa, hands resting on his stomach where he was surprised to find he wasn't wearing the special clothes Remus had charmed for him.

"Even still, both the Dark Lord and the headmaster believe it. When Lily started sporting around that fake stomach- it's a very convincing one by the way- I had believed she'd been asked to do so as a way to protect Alice Longbottom. That way once she had her son they could go into hiding and no longer be a valid target. I didn't think she'd be stupid enough to..." He couldn't find the right words as he gestured towards James. "How the hell did you even manage to do that to him?!"

Severus Snape was not a heavy drinker.

Severus Snape got really smashed the night he left the Potters home in Godric's Hollow with the revelation that James Potter was, in fact, actually a woman and swore an oath to do anything he could to protect the idiot's child. Though, Lily was kind enough to word it in a way that made him beholding to the "Son of Lily" rather than the "Son of James". It made that bitter pill just a little easier to swallow.

**o0o**

It was July 21st when Sirius Black found out.

He'd been attempting to pull a prank on James by swapping out his trousers for a tutu.

Instead, Prongs had opened a cabinet, slapping Sirius in the face with the cabinet door without realizing the man was standing in their kitchen under James's invisibility cloak, and Sirius's spell went wide, ricocheted off a couple of pots and pans and struck Lily just as she was coming into the kitchen for a refill on her tea.

At which point she jumped, shouted in surprise and then screamed as James turned, saw Sirius's flailing arm sticking out of the cloak, assumed it was an intruder and yanked him about trying to disarm him.

Lily shouts, "Jamie! The baby!" which made Sirius panic, thinking he'd done something that hurt Lily, only for James to let go and watch as Sirius started flailing about in confusion and dismay as he realized he had a giant belly where he hadn't had one before.

Sirius turned, walked face first into the door to the back garden, and fell backwards onto the floor.

"For the love of... Padfoot! How many times do you have to be told! Don't sneak up on me like that!" James had shouted at him angrily, despite the fact he'd knocked himself out.

Sirius had woken about an hour later to find Lily kindly wiping at his forehead with a damp rag, minus her large, pregnant belly, and looking absolutely fine about it. Smiling at him, even. "You know, Padfoot," she said, grinning mischievously. "Thanks for taking the little one for a while. You have no idea how hard being pregnant is on my back."

Sirius moved only his eyes, saw the protruding belly from his abdomen, barked in surprise and shock and shouted, "Merlin's balls! I'm having Prongs' baby!" and passed out again.

**o0o**

When Sirius finally came around again, he was alone, sans the belly, and found the Potters sitting down to dinner with Remus. A fourth place had been set at the table for him to join them. "Well well, if it isn't Sleeping Beauty."

"I had the worst nightmare..." Sirius said as he sat down at the table and started to help himself to some roast potatoes. "I'd accidentally stolen your baby and ended up pregnant."

"Oh that happened," James said.

Lily grinned at Sirius wickedly. "It was a relief to get a break from that thing for a few hours. Really, thank you."

Sirius had just had a potato on his fork, about to eat it when he looked to Remus who, with a straight face just said, "You look good nine months pregnant, Padfoot," and then continued to eat his dinner.

By the time dinner was over, Sirius was forced to swear an unbreakable oath to keep what he'd learned secret, but only in exchange for being named their child's official godfather. But he'd share with Remus of course.

**o0o**

"Lilyfire," James said in the late evening of July 31st, 1980. Lily looked up from her notes, frowning at James standing in the doorway of her workroom. It had been moved to the basement when they'd converted the second upstairs room into a nursery for the baby.

"Is everything alright, Jamie?"

"I think my water just broke."

Lily's eyes went wide as she nearly fell off her stool in her scramble to get up and out of the room.

She'd called Remus and Sirius over through the floo, instructing Remus to go down and make sure she'd put out all the fires under the cauldrons and all of her experiments were safely put into stasis while she went and cut her hair, cancelled various spells and changed into her muggle attire.

Sirius was charged with making sure James was comfortable and had everything he needed until they were ready to go. It had to be the muggle way, too, since there was no telling what might happen to him and the baby in a floo, portkey, or apparition. Knowing their luck they'd arrive and leave the poor child stuck half-way between fireplaces or spinning out across Ottery St. Catchpole via portkey.

Besides, they couldn't exactly just pop in out of nowhere at a muggle hospital now could they?

**o0o**

Hardwin Romulus Evans was born at 11:59PM on July 31st, 1980.

And after being cleaned up, weighed, measured, and made sure he could cry with the best of them, laid in the arms of his exhausted mother.

"Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Evans," the nurse said as she laid the child carefully in Jamie's arms. "It's a healthy, bouncy baby boy."

**o0o**

A week later, Hyacinth and William Evans were killed in a car accident on their way to Wales to visit their second grandchild. The one they never expected to even have.

Lily was devastated, but did her best to pull through. Even as Petunia and Vernon insulted her when she attempted to try and help with the arrangements. She took it and swallowed it down when Petunia blamed her for their parents deaths. Called her and her husband both freaks.

And when Vernon joined in, calling her newborn son one as well....

Well...

There's a reason why later in life Vernon couldn't stand the sight of the boy that had been foisted on them. It wasn't because he looked like James. It wasn't because he was a magical child. It was because he'd get that same wild, angry look in his eyes – Lily's eyes – when he was upset. The same look Lily got right before she punched him so hard he fell right on his lard filled ass right there in the funeral home just before complaining about his glass jaw chipping her freshly manicured nails.

**o0o**

Lily and James eventually learned what little bit of the prophecy Severus had overheard, and separately counted how many times they themselves fit the bill.

"We've only fought him... what... twice each?" Lily had said as James was casting the charm on his chest – the same one Lily had shown him after their first date in the muggle world together where Jamie could finally be more like her real self. "You've gotten really good at that."

"Well I had to. He won't take a bottle unless i do this first. Doesn't matter that I can't actually... well..."

"I know, love. Sev's been working on something that might help with the next one. That is, if you want to..."

"Ask me that again in a year or two. Harry's more than enough of a handful as it is," James said, looking down at the baby in his arms. "Oy, not so rough now. You know nothing's coming out of there any time soon, Prongslet."

"He's working on mice right now and it seems to have good results so far. Hopefully he'll be able to get some volunteers at some of the smaller healer clinics to test it when it reaches the next step for trials."

"Anyway, you were saying?... About the thing..."

"Right," Lily said, tucking a bit of hair back behind her ear. "I've been going over what little we have and even if the birthdate for Harry fits, nothing else does. You've only faced him twice. I've only faced him twice. Neither of us have faced him a third time that we know of, so Harry can't possibly be the right child."

"Even so... I'm worried, Lils. Something... something about that prophecy has me bugged. I can't explain it. It feels almost like it's too.... OW! Harry, sweetling, not so hard."

"Here, let me take him. He might take a bottle now," Lily offered. James happily handed the baby, getting up to prep a bottle for him. When he came back to the table and handed it over, the baby took to it greedily. James cancelled the charm and buttoned his shirt back up before sitting down.

"I think it's too convenient that this prophecy came up when it did. Supposing it's not real, both sides are still believing in it. If we can, I don't know, prove that Harry's not the one maybe we can escape. Run away and leave it all behind us."

"They killed your parents, James."

"I hated my father anyway."

"And your mother?"

James didn't say anything to that right away. Instead he raked a hand through his hair and took off his glasses, laying them aside on the unread newspaper beside his half-eaten breakfast and thought. Really thought about what was going through his head these days. "My mum said something to me a few years ago that I... I didn't really understand at the time. But now," he looked at Harry, happily suckling away at his breakfast. "I think I understand better than she ever thought I might."

Lily frowned. "What did she say?"

"It was after... after my father told me that when I came home for Yule I was going to be taking the last potion to... finish what was started when I was five," he said. "She told me that my father was a Potter, but my mother was a Carrow. They're petty and hold grudges for centuries... And that they'll do anything to protect their children. My father hit me that day, and she hit him back twice as hard. All these years I resented her for what she helped my father do, but knowing what goes on behind Lucius Malfoy's doors, I can understand why she went along with it." James reached over and couldn't take Lily's hand because she was holding the bottle of Harry. But he put it on her forearm. Needing the touch for his own comfort more than anything else.

"I've... I've got this bad feeling. Right in my gut. I think... I think we're on the wrong side of this thing."

"Do you have any idea what you're saying, Jamie?"

"I... I do."

"The dark lord wants to kill people like me."

"I know. And I'm not saying we join him. We just give him cause to ignore Harry even exists. Peter's got family in Ireland. Maybe we can... Peter can smuggle us out of England and from there we'll leave. We'll just snap our wands and walk away."

"Where will we go?"

"The muggle world. The purebloods wouldn't dare try to look for us there. We'll be out of the way of the war so the Dark Lord won't have any reason to look for Harry-"

"And what about Alice and Frank? Their son was born the day before ours-"

"If Alice and Frank want to be reckless and get themselves killed then..." James said, echoing an argument early on in their marriage. "Then that's not any business of mine. You, Harry, and the boys are all that matter to me."

"And what will you tell Sirius? Remus? Peter?"

"I don't know, but I'm sure I'll come up with a very convincing argument at some point."

**o0o**

James and Lily began writing letters to Severus Snape. He couldn't be seen with them, nor around them. But that didn't mean a concerned friend from his pre-Hogwarts days couldn't get back in touch with him.

And so James and Lily began passing messages to Severus through the muggle post. Of course they didn't sign anything as Lily or James, but as Marcus and Florence Evans, a cousin of Lily and Petunia who hadn't seen or heard from Lily in years.

And so it was James learned that Peter's distance from his friends had been because he'd fallen in with the Dark Lord after Hogwarts. The dates he went on while Remus watched over his sick, old mother were really Death Eater meetings.

Peter was free to come and go around the Potters as he wished, and would bring them messages from time to time over the following year.

Between Severus and Lily they managed to create a potion to restore the mind, with Lily believing she was working on a restorative for those who had suffered the cruciatis or due to their advanced age had fallen victim to senility and dementia. It wasn't until Peter had asked James to come with him to visit his aunt in Dublin that the Potters learned the real purpose behind the charms and potions Severus and Lily were working on in secret together outside their work on new textbooks.

"Lord Potter," Tom Riddle had said, offering his hand to the man who walked through the door of squib Patricia Pettigrew McDermot's back garden.

James pulled his wand, only for Peter to gently put a hand on his arm and lower it. "Please, he only wants to talk. There will be no violence in my aunt's home, Prongs. You promised me."

"He killed my parents."

"You hated them anyway."

"That doesn't change the fact he nearly killed me and people I care about."

Mr. Riddle lowered his hand. "Lord Potter, I merely wished to convey my gratitude to your goodly wife for her contributions to my recovery. Considering you have a young child at home, it would be remiss of me to have called her here rather than yourself."

"The... Lily's... Lily's mind charms?" James looked to Peter, who nodded.

"James, please, just hear him out. Severus and I we, well, once our Lord began to think clearly again we... went to him with your concerns."

"I told you my thoughts about that thing in confidence. You, Remus, and Sirius."

"Yes, and Lily asked Severus his opinions on it as well," Peter protested as if the Dark Lord wasn't left ignored a few feet away.

Said Dark Lord cleared his throat to draw their attention back to himself. "Lord Potter, in my madness I was ready to believe anything that would gain me power. I lost my way, and-"

"And you didn't really intent to kill all those innocent people?"

"James!"

"He's right Peter. I don't ask you to forgive what I've done. This war has ripped our world apart for the last thirty some odd years. I am not innocent in this and Lord Potter became an auror to protect the ones that are from the ones like me. He has every right to be suspicious of my motives and angry at what I've done and others have done in my name."

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't slap you in cuffs right now and haul your ass down to the Ministry."

"Your son. Harry, I believe is the name?"

"You leave my son out of this!"

"I fully intend to. And the Longbottom boy as well," Mr. Riddle said. "In return for what your wife's work has done to help me correct some... damage that was done long ago, you have my word that I will not pursue you should you decide to simply... vanish. I hear South America is good this time of year, but I'm sure you'd prefer to choose someone both far away and beyond anything I may think of."

"The word of a criminal like you doesn't amount to much."

"You're right. Which is why I make you this additional offer. Should you choose to disappear where neither side of this conflict can find you, Peter has agreed to help devise a plan to falsify your deaths. All three of you, and the Longbottoms too if they wish it. Severus will supply body doubles, Peter will secure passage, and I will ensure none of my followers will be able to track you. I won't know where you will have gone, for your own safety as well as mine, and that will be that. Should your son grow up and wish to return to England, I nor my followers will approach him if he does not wish it so."

James thought on it for a long moment. He'd suggested something similar to Lily himself not that long ago. And while Alice and Frank were good friends of theirs, James was still ready to throw them under the bus if it meant protecting his son. The son he'd nearly lost so early on. The son he never thought he'd ever be able to even have.

Lily would kill him but... He offered his hand. "I want an unbreakable vow, or no deal."

"State your terms, Lord Potter," Mr. Riddle said, reaching out and taking his hand. "Peter, you will of course be our bonder?"

"Of course, my Lord. That is... if that's alright, James?"

"Lets get to it then," James said, never taking his eyes off the pale, gaunt looking man in front of him.

**o0o**

"You did WHAT?!"

"No so loud, Lily. You'll wake the baby."

"You made a deal with You-know-who. James are you insane!"

James tugged at his hair as he paced their living room. "No, I'm not. Okay, maybe a little. But damn it Lily! I had to do something! He's agreed not to pursue us, or Harry. He actually seemed rather reasonable after I insisted he make an unbreakable vow."

"He... You insi... you insis...." Lily felt around behind her before finding the sofa and falling to the cushions, feeling rather faint. "My God... why do you have to be so pretty but so damn stupid..."

James was instantly sitting beside her, pulling her hand into his lap and holding it between both of his own. "Lily, please. Trust me. Peter... Peter's got a plan. Not a very thorough one yet but we're working on it. You, me, and Harry. We'll leave here and go to the muggle world. Settle down somewhere far, far away from here."

"And what will we do about money? The moment you walk into a wizarding bank they'll know exactly who you are and where you ran off to."

"We'll have everything transferred to muggle accounts using our muggle names. Even Severus is willing to help. Everyone will think we're dead and-"

"What about Remus? And Sirius? It would kill them to think we... to think little Harry..."

"Peter will handle that. We've got that part worked out at least. There's been talk in the Order of sending us into hiding. Minnie suggested we use the Fidelius Charm. But I've managed to hold them off that for now. Even still, everyone's going to expect us to choose Sirius or Remus as a secret keeper, but I'll convince Sirius that it's better if it's Peter. That way he can help us sneak away and-"

"And they'll out Peter as a... as a death eater spy."

"Well... yes. There is that..."

"And they won't listen to a word he says."

"They will if he has memories to prove it."

"I don't like this James. I don't like any of this."

"I know. And when we're safe in a new house, somewhere.... on a beach. Or in the middle of the thickest forest we can find, you can make me sleep on the sofa every night for the rest of our lives if you want to. No complaints from me. But the more I look at what the Order's doing... the more I think about was Severus told us, I can't help but be afraid that one day very soon we won't have a choice anymore and the three of us aren't going to live to see the end of this war."

He brought her hand to his lips, pressing it there and holding her hand tight. A silent plea to trust him. To please, just go along with it. Let him do what he can to protect her and their son the only way he knew how.

**o0o**

It was a long.... long year.

Remus was sent off on missions to recruit or at the very least get the werewolves to remain neutral. This took him away from Sirius more and more. Which drove Sirius to overworking himself. Pulling double and sometimes triple shifts before turning around and pulling duty with the Order.

Dumbledore was eyeing him and Lily suspiciously whenever they showed up to meetings together alone. Peter did a damn good job keeping it together and not spilling a single word.

Severus's occasional presence at the meetings did very little to inspire hope for a better tomorrow.

And then they lost the Prewitt twins.

And kind, compassionate, motherly Molly Weasley was out for blood.

The Prewitts were the first deaths in the Order's ranks in months. True to his word and one of the conditions of the vow he made to Lord Potter, no one died by the Dark Lord's wand. Trying to reign in the bad bitch Bellatrix was another matter.

In private, Peter was the one to tell Lily and James that it was the Prewitts who had struck first.

Narcissa Malfoy had been pregnant with her second child. Her sister Bellatrix was with her at the time as they were making their way to Knocturn Alley from Gringotts. They'd been aiming for Bellatrix. Instead... "They hit Cissa with a rather... nasty hex. One I don't think most in the Order would approve of," Peter had said.

It was obvious, then, why the Prewitts had been targeted. Malfoy and his vicious sister-in-law had made sure those two were taken down no matter what it took.

While the Order praised Gideon and Fabian's sacrifice, and Molly Weasley swore revenge for her brothers, James and Lily quietly asked themselves if this is really what they signed up for.

**o0o**

"Did you get the new birth certificate?"

"Yes dear."

"And the passports?"

"Yes dear."

"Book the flight out of Dublin?"

"Yes. A thousand times, yes Lily!"

"And the accounts? Did you get the accounts transferred over-"

"Yes. All except the trust vault."

"WHAT?!"

"Well I can't empty Harry's trust vault! It already looks suspicious enough as it is, Lily. If i empty that and leave nothing in the bank then the goblins will be on us faster than Lucius Malfoy if we'd had a daughter!"

Lily shuddered at the thought. She knew her husband's history. He'd told it to her himself. And she knew what Fleamont had done and why – at least the reasons that James knew about and mostly understood.

"Okay then..." Lily said. "I suppose we've done all we can for now. I... Is it all in the briefcase? Ready to grab and go?"

"Yes, Lily. Everything is ready to leave at a moment's notice. This will work. We'll get out of England and wait it out until everything blows over. We'll be safe and we can raise Harry in peace a whole world away. You and me."

"And eventually the rest of the Rat Pack."

"That's right."

**o0o**

The long summer months dragged on. Dorcas Meadows was taken down. Marlene McKinnon not long after. Sirius had started behaving more erratically than ever and Remus was acting strangely. He looked... Lost the rare times James and Lily ever saw him.

Like he couldn't remember if he'd left the gas on or might have left the front door unlocked on the flat that morning.

The last time Lily had seen Severus was in September. And he looked... far more unwell than she'd ever seen him. And she had bandaged him up plenty a time after his father had beaten the hell out of him over the summers between Hogwarts years.

His last letter to them through their secret PO Box had been brief. Too brief. It had consisted of only three words.

Get out soon.

She'd shown it to James, who told Peter it was time.

**o0o**

A month. They'd been told one more month before the safe house with Peter's relatives would be ready for them. They just had to hold out until Halloween.

Two weeks before, Albus had come by to ask if he could borrow James's cloak. "It's quite unique," he'd said. "Would you mind terribly if I borrowed it, just to study it's incredible enchantments. I'll be sure to return it to you as soon as I've finished my study of it."

Lily had been against the idea. They could use it to hide Harry if all else failed. Use it for Peter to smuggle him out alone if necessary. Keep the child safe and out of harm's way until his parents or godparents could get to him. James on the other hand... He'd handed it over without question.

Only to be angry with himself the following day for having done it.

"Why..."

"The sweets! The thrice damned lemon sherbets!" Lily had exclaimed in anger as she dragged James into a chair as Harry had pulled himself up to his feet in the playpen, drooling as he watched his mummy fuss over his daddy, waving her stick around with a frown.

Harry clapped at the lights that came out of it even though mummy sounded angry.

"He drugged you. I'll bet those candies are laced with something. Some kind of calming draught, or a suggestibility potion of some sort. I won't know unless I can get my hands on one. Oooo if I hadn't asked you to take the trash out last night I could have checked the wrapper."

**o0o**

One week before Halloween and Sirius and Remus had a fight. What that fight was about, Sirius wouldn't say. Only that Remus had packed his bags and left. So Sirius did the only responsible thing and got drunk. And that was how he had landed on the Potter's sofa the day that Albus Dumbledore came by with plans to use the Fidelius Charm on the Potter home.

His excuse had been that the Dark Lord's forces were searching for the two children mentioned in the prophecy and that he had a strong suspicion that the Potters were the man's main target. "It's my belief," Albus had said. "That he will target your son Harry himself."

"But why Harry? He's not anything special," Lily had said.

"But he is. He was born at just the right time. To just the right parents," Albus said in that way that always puts people at ease whether they like it or not. "What few people know is that Lord Voldemort himself isn't a pureblood at all. He looks at the Potters and he sees a boy just like himself. A half-blood child with the potential to outshine his pure-blooded peers. We need to do everything in our power to protect young Harry. To keep him safe."

Lily didn't accept the sherbet lemon when it was offered.

James did, intending not to eat it but finding that once it was in his hand, he might as well unwrap it.

Lily tried not to let her displeasure at James show, but it was there in her eyes of one cared to look.

They had argued for a few hours. With Albus. With Sirius. Lily had even argued with James as if the idea of using Peter instead wasn't his own idea a year ago.

In the end, Sirius had left angry and Peter arrived, confused but more than happy to help his friends in their time of need.

The spell was set. Albus left, and Lily snatched the wrapper of that cursed candy in a tissue before running to her workroom with it to run some tests.

"That.... that vile, repugnant, pustule of a toerag!" she'd shouted angrily as she climbed the stairs up from the basement.

"What?"

"He's put compulsion charms on the bloody wrappers!" she shouted as Peter bounced Harry on his knee now that he'd woken from his nap. "And just as I suspected, there's traces of potions in the flecks of candy left stuck to it! So far I've got calming and suggestibility, as I had initially thought. But there's a trace of something else I can't identify. Not without a whole piece of the stuff anyway."

**o0o**

Plans were made.

The safe house was ready.

The body doubles were nearly done. It would be a few more days before they'd be fully grown. All they needed now was a hair each and the wands of the ones they were meant to replace.

There were new ones ready in the suitcase with their passports. They didn't have the trace on them.

Peter and Mr. Riddle were going to bring their old ones with them so they could use them one last time, to put a fresh magical signature on them before leaving them behind and running away into the night.

Only...

**o0o**

On Halloween night, 1981, Lily and James Potter were in the sitting room, playing with their son as they waited for their important visitor to show up. Outside, muggle children ran too and fro trick-or-treating. It was the perfect time to enact their plan. Too many people in costumes running around. No one would notice a family of three slipping into the crowds dressed in funny clothes.

Instead of the jingle of the floo, or even a knock at the back door in the kitchen, their front door was blasted open.

"Tom?! Is everything alright? We weren't expecting-"

Lord Voldemort raised his wand, but Peter reached out to try and stop him. "James Lily! Run! Something's happened! He's not himself! GO!"

Peter was cast aside as James turned to his wife, eyes begging her to forgive him for this. To forgive him for making a deal with the devil. For being so damn reckless with their lives. "Lily! Take Harry and go! Run!"

"Jamie!"

"I'll hold him off!" James shouted, throwing himself into the Dark Lord's path to buy his wife just a little more time.

Lily held Harry close and ran in the only direction she could. Up. There was no escape through the master bedroom. But perhaps... Perhaps nursery! Yes! If she could get the window open, she could grab Harry and climb out and... well, it was a hell of a drop but if she could just focus she might be able to pull off a wandless arresto momentum. If she could just get outside the wards she could apparate away with Harry and-

The window wouldn't open. She could hear him coming closer. She slammed the bedroom door closed, trying to haul Harry's dresser in front of it before she decided to go smash that bloody window.

The door was shattered, the dresser as well. Splinters dug into Lily's back as she shielded her son from the flying debris. She knelt down quickly, reaching for her boy and kissing his temple, tears in her eyes. "Mummy and daddy love you very much, Harry," she said before turning to face the laughing maniac that stepped over the remains of the door and the dresser of her son's nursery.

"Not Harry!" she shouted defiantly. "You promised us! Not Harry! Please, not Harry!"

"Stand aside you silly girl... stand aside now."

She could feel... something. Something crackling just beneath her skin and stood her ground. James was dead. But come hell or high water, this war wouldn't claim Harry, too. "Not Harry!" she shouted again. "Take me! Kill me instead!"

"I said move aside!"

Lily refused to move. "You gave your word! You made a Vow! Have mercy!"

Lord Voldemort raised his wand, and Lily swallowed back the last of her fear. The last of her doubt. She knew she wasn't going to survive this night. Nothing went to plan. It had all gone pear shaped.

But if she was going to die... she was going to take this bastard with her. Somehow, some way.

"No!" Lily snarled, refusing for the third and final time.

"Avada Kedavra!"

And with a blinding flash of green, she was dead. And the wand was turned on the boy in the crib.

**o0o**

No one really knew what happened in Godric's Hollow that night.

Peter presumably came to and ran searching through the house for Lily and Harry, finding only a wailing, injured child and the dead bodies of his parents. A bone white wand and empty black robes.

The sound of footsteps spooking Peter before he could steal little Harry away and whisk him off to safety.

Snape had come as soon as he realized the mistake he had made. The wrong potion given to the man who'd promised to help his best friend and her family escape the war. His hands still shaking as he stepped over the body of James Potter and made his way upstairs, following the sound of a crying child and finding instead a blood covered infant and his dead mother cold on the floor.

Too distressed and distracted and his head still foggy from fighting the imperius that had forced him to give Tom Riddle the wrong potion, undoing more than a year's worth of work in restoring the man's faculties. He didn't see the rat scurrying away with a wand clamped between its teeth.

Snape was chased off by the sound of a familiar motorcycle in the distance as Sirius Black, panic stricken and filled with fear assumed the worst when he'd checked on Peter and found his hiding place empty and torn apart like someone had been through it looking for something.... or someone.

So many things went wrong that night it was easy to forget a little thing here.

A little thing there.

Overlook a faulty ward, a hidden little detection charm.

A little lemon sherbet wrapper falling out of a pocket of a leather coat as a baby was passed from godfather to half-giant who, somehow, managed to conveniently arrive just at the right moment to take the crying, injured little burden away.

**o0o**

Petunia Dursley had adored her younger brother when they were young children. And while she didn't understand why her parents let him keep her dresses when she outgrew them, she never really complained too much. Until Liliam started getting teased at school about his long hair. Or his lacy socks.

Their parents thought it was just a phase. Until it wasn't. And it kept going on for years.

And Petunia started to understand it wasn't normal for little boys to want to pretend to be little girls. And then she started getting picked on, too.

She never really hated Liliam- or rather, Lily as he preferred to be called. But she couldn't be seen to like him very much. She had so few friends of her own as it was.

And then the foolish boy had to go and be an even bigger weirdo and do magic and gossip about girls with that strange boy she met at the park. She was grateful when Liliam went off to that weird boarding school for most of the year. People could forget about her freaky little brother for a year.

At least until he insisted on introducing himself to new people as Petunia's little sister.

She didn't even find out about Liliam getting married until after their parents had died. Died on the way to see her and her son. A woman that, Petunia learned, was just as freaky and weird as her brother was.

And then... then she got a call from Lily around six months before opening her door on the morning of November 1st, 1981. She'd forgotten all about that call, made from a payphone she'd been told, since they couldn't use one in their home because of all the magic in the air or something of the sort.

Her brother... sister, had sounded so scared. So frightened on the phone that day. Telling her things with the 'freaky people' as Petunia called them were getting dangerous and she was so afraid for her family. Her husband had gone and done something really stupid and... and she hoped it worked but had a really bad feeling about it.

And she just wanted to hear her big sister's voice. She just wanted to hear Petunia say it was going to be okay. That it was going to work out. That everything was going to be fine.

She hadn't been able to do that.

She'd shouted through the phone instead. Blaming Liliam again for the death of their parents. For being so damn strange and weird and abnormal and freaky.

But now, as she looked at the tiny thing sleeping in the cot next to her Dudders, those bright green eyes closed with a little thumb stuck in his mouth, she wished she hadn't been so cruel. The last time her brother... her sister ever heard her voice she was a shrill, hateful harpy.

Vernon handed her blanket the boy had been wrapped in when she'd found him and when she took it, he winced.

"What's the matter?" she asked as he put his thumb to his mouth. He blinked a moment then looked at the tiny puncture in his thumb. He gave it another quick squeeze with his teeth and thought for a moment he tasted lemons but couldn't really be certain.

"Careful with that Pet," he said. "I think it's got some kind of pin in it. Probably just what they used to stick the letter to him so it wouldn't blow away."

Later, when Petunia was doing the wash. She wasn't careful, and hissed as she wadded up the blanket to add to the laundry. When she brought the finger to her mouth in an attempt to stop the bleeding. She thought for just a brief moment...

No no... she hadn't touched lemons all day. Though now that she thought about it... some fresh lemonade didn't sound too bad right about now...

**o0o**

Petunia Dursley received a package in the mail from... somewhere. She didn't have a clue. There was no return address. Perhaps, she thought, it was some extra Christmas presents from some relatives. Didn't she and Liliam have a cousin somewhere back in Cokeworth?

She opened the box at the kitchen table just after clearing away lunch for the Vernon and Dudley and The Boy. The Boy that looked at her with her brother's eyes. A constant, irritating reminder of the vile, disgusting people he'd fallen in with and their unnatural, abnormal ways.

Petunia sorted through the box, finding mostly useless things. A couple of passports. After looking at one of them, there was her brother's smiling face looking up at her. A fresh haircut and all. "At least he had enough sense to use his real name," she'd muttered as she dug around and found a file with three papers in it. Birth certificates. She saw a couple of stuffed animals as well. A rat, two dogs, and a deer. They must have belonged to The Boy.

The box was taped back closed. "Vernon, could you run this up to the attic for me later, dear?"

"What's in it?"

"Just some things from my brother's house," she said with a shrug. "Nothing all that important."

And so the box Peter Pettigrew had snuck out of his hiding place with the Weasley family to put together for little Harry was put away. Forgotten and buried under old, broken Christmas presents. Busted furniture and gaudy, overpriced lawn ornaments year after long and agonizing year.

**Author's Note:**

> I MAY eventually do a companion piece to this about Lily's childhood and life up until she married James, but I dunno yet. This entire thing was written in one day so I'm kind of surprised I managed to get it done and at least spellchecked.
> 
> Anyway, that's that. Thanks for reading.


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